


Meet Me On The West Side (Story)

by lanaroolz



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Marching Band, Fluff, Fluff With Very Little Plot, M/M, aggressive use of the nickname “duckie”, feat TWICE as the flute section and Red Velvet as various other band members, time for an extremely self indulgent marching band au!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-23
Updated: 2021-01-23
Packaged: 2021-03-15 14:07:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,767
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28939701
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lanaroolz/pseuds/lanaroolz
Summary: It didn’t hit Donghyuck until the first day of band camp that sophomore year was going to be completely different. Obviously, there was a lot that was objectively different: he was no longer a freshman, he was a section leader, he was rooming with Renjun and lived in the south quad, etc., etc., but that wasn’t what he meant. No, the one thing he forgot to factor into his decision to tick the box next to Mark Lee’s name on the student ballots for drum major last year was that Mark was no longer going to be standing next to him in rehearsal, no longer going to be laughing directly behind him in the stands, no longer going to be on the field with him before pregame, and all around, no longer going to be a meaningful part of his NCTU Marching Band experience.(So what if Mark spent all season being a fancy drum major and had no time for him anymore? Donghyuck was going to have a great time anyway, and Mark could just shove it.)
Relationships: Lee Donghyuck | Haechan/Mark Lee
Comments: 11
Kudos: 83





	Meet Me On The West Side (Story)

**Author's Note:**

> Hello, once again, I am back, this time with yet even more boys than before (and last time there were so many boys…). ty to NCT for having 23 members and inspiring me to write an ensemble fic lmao. Will I ever write more than one fic for the same pairing again? Only time will tell. 
> 
> Welcome NCTzens! That’s right, we got ourselves a new kpop band and a marching band AU based on my not insignificant 8 years of marching band experience. I honestly had such a good time writing this fic and making up marching band antics, and I hope you guys like it! Not me spending days trying to assign all 23 members of NCT an appropriate instrument and then only mentioning a handful of them in my fic. Anyway, I’ll put my instrument headcanons in the end notes so those of you that have strong opinions on them can argue with me about it in the comments, haha. 
> 
> Just for reference, I squished everyone’s ages together, so 02s and 01s are freshmen, 00s and 99s are sophomores, 98s and 97s are juniors, 96s and 95s are seniors, and Taeil has graduated lmao sorry Taeil.
> 
> I imagine NCTUMB being pronounced as N-C-Tumb, and I hope you do to.

It didn’t hit Donghyuck until the first day of band camp that sophomore year was going to be completely different. Obviously, there was a lot that was objectively different: he was no longer a freshman, he was a section leader, he was rooming with Renjun and lived in the south quad, etc., etc., but that wasn’t what he meant. No, the one thing he forgot to factor into his decision to tick the box next to Mark Lee’s name on the student ballots for drum major last year was that Mark was no longer going to be standing next to him in rehearsal, no longer going to be laughing directly behind him in the stands, no longer going to be on the field with him before pregame, and all around, no longer going to be a meaningful part of his NCTU Marching Band experience.

Donghyuck looked across the field to where Mark and Ten, the other drum major, were practicing conducting instead of standing in arches with the rest of the band and frowned. Yeah, he had other friends, and obviously, he had the clarinets, but it wasn’t the same. Donghyuck’s whole marching band experience basically revolved around Mark Lee, and now he had essentially been abandoned by him. He glanced over to his right, where Tzuyu had taken what used to be Mark’s spot next to him at the end of the flute section. She smiled when he caught her eye.

“Hey Duckie,” she said, halting her search through her flip folder for the song they were about to play, “how was your break? Ready for NCTUMB round two?”

Ah, his band nickname, given to him by the official trombone section nicknamer, currently Johnny, who gave every freshman in the band a nickname every year. They usually didn’t stick, since having to come up with dozens of nicknames at once made most of them laughably terrible, but “Duckie” had stuck, quite stubbornly. He even had a few friends outside of band that called him Duckie. Hearing it made him grin in spite of himself. God, he’d missed band. So what if Mark spent all season being a fancy drum major and had no time for him anymore? Donghyuck was going to have a great time anyway, and Mark could just shove it.

“Yeah, I am so ready,” he said with a smile.

-

Doyoung and Donghyuck, well, they didn’t exactly get along in the classic sense. Doyoung was the kind of person who couldn’t help but take everything extremely seriously and extremely personally. Donghyuck was the kind of person who probably couldn’t be serious if his life depended on it. Donghyuck’s freshman year, Doyoung’s first year as clarinet section leader, Donghyuck had spent, by Doyoung’s count, approximately every second of every minute of the entire season making fun of him, disrupting sectionals, violating uniform code, and just in general making sure that his life was a living hell.

Now, they were co-section leaders, and Doyoung had been preparing all summer for Donghyuck to make this year even worse than the last.

Except, well, he didn’t.

Donghyuck was, surprisingly, taking his new section leader duties very seriously. During sectionals, he gave actually helpful tips in between cracking jokes. While they were running drill, he made sure everyone was in the right spot before messing around with Jeno. All in all, he was using his bright personality to make the clarinet section fun instead of imbuing it with chaos. Well, there was still a little chaos, it was still Donghyuck after all, but it was fun chaos. “Chaotic Good,” Jungwoo would have called him, if Jungwoo hadn’t switched from clarinet to sousa two years ago.

Most surprisingly of all, however, was how Donghyuck subtly shifted from laughing at Doyoung to laughing with him. If Donghyuck cracked a joke at his expense, he sought Doyoung’s eyes, looking for an objection, and if he found one, he immediately changed the topic. Doyoung found that he didn’t mind Donghyuck’s jokes as much anymore. 

What he did mind was Donghyuck corrupting Shotaro, their adorable new sophomore, a clarinet performance major who “missed marching band” and decided to join up, despite the fact that he already spent probably at least 5 hours a day playing the clarinet. So cute.

“Duckie,” Doyoung sighed, trying not to sound too disappointed and failing.

“Doie,” Donghyuck answered back with wide, innocent eyes. Doyoung was very afraid of those eyes.

“What are you doing?” 

“I’m just teaching Shotaro how to time a squeak for maximum comedic payoff.” Donghyuck’s eyes got, if possible, even wider. Shotaro, at least, had the decency to look guilty.

“Duckie, I’m begging you, I know you’ve already gotten to Jisung, but please do not expand the squeaking clarinet choir.” He grabbed Donghyuck’s shoulders and shook him a little. “When Wendy graduated, I thought I would finally be free, but then she trained you as her protegee just to spite me from the beyond. Is there no mercy?” Okay, Doyoung could admit that he was being a little ridiculous, but the giggle that Shotaro let out at his dramatics filled him with an immense sense of satisfaction. Wow, no wonder Donghyuck was the way he was; this feeling was amazing.

“Doyoung, what kind of section leader would I be if I didn’t at least try to stand in Wendy’s very, very small shoes?” Donghyuck laughed, but then he schooled his face into a somewhat serious expression. “Should we kill the squeaking clarinet choir? Wendy would be disappointed, but she’d probably be the only one.”

Doyoung looked at Donghyuck in shock. Yes, the squeaking clarinet choir was immensely annoying, perhaps the most annoying thing he’d ever been forced to experience in his entire life, but he didn’t actually think that he had any sort of power to stop it. Certainly nothing he’d tried in the past three years had put a dent in the worst NCTUMB clarinet section tradition, and he didn’t have the self-importance to think that he was going to change that this year. “What? Are you serious? You’d kill the choir with me?”

“Doyoung,” Donghyuck said, looking right at him earnestly, “we’re co-section leaders now. We make decisions together. If you want to kill the choir, we can kill the choir,” he said, as if it was that simple. Donghyuck held out a hand, presumably for Doyoung to take. Doyoung gripped it awkwardly.

Donghyuck gave him an exasperated look. “Okay, first things first, we need a handshake.”

“A handshake?”

“Yeah, a secret handshake, you know, to solidify our friendship.”

“Do we need a secret handshake to solidify our friendship?” Doyoung couldn’t help but ask. This kid was really weird.

Donghyuck scoffed. “Obviously. Don’t worry, we’ll workshop it.”

-

Mark knew that he was not being a good friend. He knew it, and he felt bad, but he had his reasons, even if they were bad ones. Even if they were terrible ones. And, he knew that if Donghyuck knew what was going on in his head, he would probably just laugh at him, but—

Here’s the thing: Mark was awkward, and Donghyuck was, ah, like sunshine?

He had gotten used to the full force of Donghyuck’s personality last year, but the summer apart had apparently done something to him, or done something to Donghyuck, maybe, because suddenly he couldn’t handle it anymore. And, for some reason, seeing Donghyuck now made him nervous? Like, he was sweating when he handed Donghyuck his uniform during band camp, and Donghyuck had given him this look like he was being weird because he was definitely being weird, but he couldn’t help it. It was like someone reached in his head and just switched off his brain, and then he had to try to continue to function normally but with no brain. It was extremely unnerving.

So, anyway, that’s why Mark had told Donghyuck that he couldn’t sit with the clarinets at lunch during band camp because he had to sit with Ten for drum major bonding, or whatever. It had been a pretty lame excuse, especially since he and Ten were only two people and could easily just both sit with the clarinets. He saw that Donghyuck saw through it, but he couldn’t look at Donghyuck frown for one second longer because it stirred the guilt in his chest. It wasn’t Donghyuck’s fault that he had gone and gotten himself, um, whatever it was that happened to him.

Ten gave him a weird look when he sat down next to him at the freaking drumline table, no less. God, there was no way that Donghyuck didn’t know that he was avoiding him. He was the worst friend to ever exist.

“Yo, you okay?” Ten asked, startling Mark out of his thoughts.

“Yes, absolutely, I’m fine. Why wouldn’t I be?” Mark tried. Judging by the looks he was getting from Ten and from Taeyong, the drumline captain, he failed.

“Whatever you say, Mark,” Ten said. His eyes flickered over to the clarinet table. Oh no, did Ten know? The panic must have been written all over Mark’s face because when Ten turned back to look at him, his face suddenly morphed into a shit-eating grin. “Let’s sit with the clarinets tomorrow.” Well, fuck.

-

“Alright, everyone in the square-diamond thing run it again from page 8!”

Donghyuck sighed and sat down in the grass, right on his dot on page 8 of _I Have a Love_. It was probably bad form as a section leader, but he could not be bothered to keep standing for a minute longer as the square-diamond thing on the other side of the field ran through their complicated drill while he stood in a line and marked time for half the song. The rest of his line quickly followed suit, plopping onto the ground where they had been standing in place for the last 20 minutes.

The kid next to him set a trombone on the ground, and Donghyuck recognized him as one of the trombone players in his class. They had greeted each other a couple times before in passing, but had never actually spoken. Well, no time like the present!

“Hi, Yangyang, right?”

“Yeah, and you’re…Duckie?” Yangyang asked, extremely hesitantly.

Donghyuck barked out a laugh. “That’s what they call me, yes.”

“Oh, thank god,” Yangyang exhaled. “Sometimes Johnny will exclusively call people by their stupid trombone nicknames, but no one ever actually uses them, so I never know what anyone’s real name is.”

“That does sound like something Johnny would do,” Donghyuck agreed. “Why are you so far away from the other ‘bones?” He gestured to where Johnny and all the rest of the trombones were currently running their complicated drill over and over again in the square-diamond thing.

Yangyang shrugged before leaning back on his hands. “I started off with them, but I broke off with the saxes halfway through _America_ and now I’m here.” He looked over at the trombones and grimaced. “Honestly, thank god, because that drill looks miserable to run, especially with a trombone.”

Donghyuck can’t help but laugh. “Yeah, that really does look terrible.” Donghyuck flipped through his drill packet for the rest of _I Have a Love_ and _Tonight_. “Looks like your stuck with me for the rest of the show, lucky you.”

“Are you C2?” Yangyang asked. “We’re next to each other in the company fronts, I think.”

“I’d take a company front any day over whatever the hell that is,” Donghyuck looked back over at the shape on the other side of the field. He found Renjun in it and laughed out loud when he missed a turn and collided directly into another trumpet, who collided with another trumpet, sending the three of them into a heap on the ground.

“Oh no!” Yangyang gasped, but Donghyuck was laughing too hard to respond.

Across the field from where he was working with the square-diamond thing, Mark looked up the sound of Donghyuck cackling. He gave Donghyuck a pointed look and gestured for him to stand up. Donghyuck stuck his tongue out at him.

-

The first clarinet section hangout of the year went like this: Donghyuck made everyone do a shot of Fireball as soon as they walked in the door, except for the freshmen, to whom he instead gave what essentially amounted to the “I’m not a regular mom; I’m a cool mom” speech from Mean Girls. Jeno shotgunned a beer with Yeri in what turned out to be the outcome of a pact they made over the summer to shotgun a beer at every party for the entire year for no reason except to say that they did it. Yeri, immediately post shotgun, spotted Jisung, loudly christened him with the nickname “Baby Ji,” and then tackled him into the puddle of beer that Jeno and Yeri had just created. Jisung screeched as he went down, knocking over a stack of red solo cups in such a way that they flung directly into Doyoung’s face.

Doyoung could only sigh. So much for a chill get-together.

Doyoung was just glad at this point that he’d had the foresight to text the freshmen beforehand to let them know that there was absolutely no pressure to drink since, if there was ever a situation the overwhelmingly stunk with peer pressure, this was definitely it. While he was ruminating on his irresponsible role in putting impressionable 18-year-olds in bad situations, Donghyuck loudly, in the name of “section leader solidarity,” demanded that Doyoung be their anchor in the game of flip cup they were starting, and well, it was all downhill from there.

Several dozen beer-related party games later, Doyoung and Donghyuck were alone in the kitchen, literally crying into each other’s arms. How they got here, Doyoung honestly couldn’t say. They were talking about band, and then they were talking about section leader business, and then somewhere along the line Donghyuck started crying because Mark Lee wouldn’t text him back. If it had been last year, and if Doyoung had been sober, he might have peeled Donghyuck off of him and handed him over to Jeno, or anyone else, really. But it was not last year, and Doyoung was very much not sober, and so instead, Doyoung started crying too.

He cried about Jungwoo leaving the clarinet section to join to the fucking sousas, which he didn’t even remember being _that_ sad about when it happened, but apparently, he was very much not over it. Jungwoo didn’t even come to clarinet functions anymore. Had their friendship meant nothing to him? Fuck, he was drunk.

Donghyuck just continued to cry about Mark Lee, who he was obviously in love with. Doyoung’s drunk mind couldn’t really imagine why, because Mark Lee was probably the most awkward motherfucker that Doyoung had ever met, and yes, Doyoung had met himself, thank you very much. Whatever, there was just no accounting for taste.

“What is happening?” Yeri exclaimed, cutting off Donghyuck mid-sob as she and Jeno reappeared in the kitchen.

“Excuse me, we’re having a moment over here,” Donghyuck sniffed, removing his head from Doyoung’s shoulder and wiping his eyes so he could give Yeri the full force of his glare. Doyoung tried to collect himself, but he found that he couldn’t, so he just turned away in embarrassment instead.

“Our glorious leaders,” Jeno said with a snicker as the rest of the clarinets wandered into to see what the commotion was about

“Don’t look, Baby Ji,” Yeri laughed, reaching a hand to cover Jisung’s eyes. “You can’t see our section leaders like this, or you’ll lose all respect for them.”

“Well, it’s definitely too late for that,” Jisung muttered from behind Yeri.

“Says the kid who’s been playing on a chipped Rico #3,” Donghyuck shot back, as if that was a winning comeback. Wait, a chipped reed? Doyoung turned his red-rimmed eyes to Jisung, who had the audacity to look guilty.

“You play on a what?!” Doyoung exclaimed while Donghyuck fell to the floor in laughter beside him.

Honestly, Doyoung did not get paid enough for this.

-

“Okay,” Johnny said from across the beer pong table, cracking open a Keystone Light, “loser of this match has to…I don’t know. Duckie, what does the loser of this match have to do?” He began pouring the beer into the ten red solo cups carefully arranged into a triangle on his end of the table.

“Loser of this match has to dye their hair school colors!” Donghyuck said with the kind of confidence only a deeply intoxicated person could muster. Beside him, Renjun paled.

“Dye their hair school colors! I love it!” Ten laughed, swirling a pair of ping pong balls in their water cup.

“I do not want to dye my hair school colors,” Renjun said.

Ten threw a ping pong ball in a perfect arc that landed directly in the center of one of Donghyuck and Renjun’s cups. “Then don’t lose!”

-

They lost.

-

Renjun and Donghyuck sat on the ground in the bathroom on their floor and looked down at the boxes of hair dye that Donghyuck was holding. Jeno and Jaemin had been over to help them with the initial stages of the bleaching, but that was hours ago, and they were long gone at this point. Honestly Renjun didn’t know how he got himself into this kind of shit. That was what he got for being friends with Donghyuck, he supposed.

“Okay, I’ll do red, and you can do blue?” Donghyuck asked, weighing the two boxes is his hands.

Renjun grimaced. Blue hair was so not the vibe. But, then again, red hair was, if possible, even further from the vibe. He knew he would end up regretting it either way, so he just sighed and grabbed the blue dye out of Donghyuck’s hands. “This is going to be the worst mistake of my life.”

“Come on, it’ll be fun. Don’t you have any school spirit?” Donghyuck asked, wriggling his eyebrows. Renjun could only roll his eyes. “Besides, there weren’t any terms to the bet, so you can dye it back whenever you want.”

At that, Renjun hesitated. “Well, it would be stupid to go to all of this trouble and not leave it blue for at least one football game…”

Donghyuck broke into a wide grin, “That’s what I’m talking about!”

-

Ten watched Mark struggle with the podium, again. It was several weeks into the season, but he still was absolutely hopeless at it, the poor kid. Mark was good at a lot of things, even criminally good at a lot of things, but setting up the podium so far had been the one task that he just could not accomplish. Well, Ten figured it was only fair that he had to be terrible at something, considering that he was probably the most talented marcher that he had ever seen, and that was including all friends in drum corps. Ten started making his way over to him as Mark used his right foot to stabilize the back end of the podium while unfolding it, carefully. Okay, so far, so good. Now, if he could just—

“Mark!”

Mark abruptly lost his holding on the podium, and it snapped together and pitched forward, knocking him off balance, leaving Ten with barely had enough time to sprint over, snatch it from the other side, and save Mark from an inevitable, podium-induced death. He grabbed a hold of it with about a second left to spare, and let out a laugh at the look of absolute resignation on Mark’s face.

“Careful, Mark,” Ten said with grin, “we wouldn’t want to lose you to the marching band gods just yet. Though, I’m sure they’d love to have you.”

Mark resolutely ignored Ten and turned towards the person who had called out his name. Except, it was Donghyuck, and Donghyuck’s hair was—

“Oh my god, Duckie,” Ten shrieked, “your hair!”

Donghyuck briefly stopped walking towards them so he could pause to do a hair flip as dramatically as possible. His noxiously bright, fire-engine red hair messily settled around his face, and he grinned widely. “What do you think?”

“I have to say, I didn’t think you’d actually do it. Wow, that is bright,” Ten said with a laugh. Understatement of the year, probably. He grabbed a hold of Donghyuck and ruffled his hair a bit for good measure.

“I figured, if I’m going to dye my hair red, might as well go all out,” Donghyuck said, shrugging out of Ten’s grasp. He turned towards Mark, who was still standing stock still where the podium had almost crushed him into smithereens. “Hey Mark, you still have that camera, right?”

“I—uh, yeah.” Ten could literally see the cogs turning in Mark’s head and barely refrained from rolling his eyes. Wow, this kid was truly helpless in the face of one (1) cute boy.

“Great, I’m making Renjun do a roomie photoshoot with me to show off our hair before it washes out in, like, two days because we bought the cheapest dye available at Walgreens. Do you want to be our photographer? I want these pics to look good, because I’m definitely never doing this ever again.”

Ten watched the emotions dance across Marks face. Was Mark really going to turn down this chance practically gifted to him on a silver platter to hang out with the kid he obviously had a crush on? From behind Donghyuck, he gave Mark a look that he hoped explicitly said, “Don’t be an idiot.”

“Yeah, I can do that. When are you thinking?” Mark says, eventually. Thank god, did Ten really have to do all the work around here?

Ten gave Mark a thumbs up. Mark’s face turned pink at the sight of it, and he hurriedly turned back to look at Donghyuck, focusing all his attention on him instead. Ten could only laugh. Kids these days.

-

Donghyuck frowned down at Mark, who was standing on the podium fiddling with the headset and looking adorably confused in his drum major uniform. Mark had been weird all season, but last night, during the photoshoot to immortalize his red hair that he had forced both Mark and Renjun to participate in, Mark had been extra weird. Mark was fine when he was talking to Renjun, but when he talked to Donghyuck, he got all cagey and deflective, and his dude-to-literally-any-other-word ratio skyrocketed. After the first fifteen minutes or so, he seemed to let go of whatever it was that was bothering him and was mostly normal, but Donghyuck just couldn’t shake it. Why was Mark being so weird? Did becoming a drum major really change their relationship that much? Was their friendship based solely on Mark’s insecurities as male flute player, and now that he wasn’t a flute and had other guy friends in the band, did he not need Donghyuck anymore?

At least the pictures turned out bomb.

Donghyuck startled when Mark started counting off, realizing he had spaced out for several minutes and had no idea what stand tune was up.

Next to him, Jeno elbowed him and flashed him his flip folder displaying _25 or 6 to 4_ , which, yup, that’s definitely what they were playing. It would probably take him the whole song to find it in his flip folder because he had yet to alphabetize his stand tunes, so he decided on the tried-and-true method of “just hope you have the first couple phrases memorized since they’re going to cut us off at measure 17 anyway.”

It turned out that Donghyuck did not have the first couple phrases of _25 or 6 to 4_ memorized, but hey, what can you do.

In the row in front of them, Jaemin turned around after the song cut off, leveeing Donghyuck and Jeno with an unimpressed look. “Love it when you guys decide to just play random notes instead of the actual song. It really adds to the experience. Maybe we should all be doing that. What if half of us played _Seven Nation Army_ in B flat and half of us played it in A flat? I think we would start a new trend.”

“First of all, shut up, I know you can’t play a single note of _25 or 6 to 4_ because you told me that every time it came up in basketball band last year,” Donghyuck started.

Jaemin shrugged, but he was doing a bad job of holding in a laugh. “The alto part is hard, okay?”

“Second of all, I don’t know why you think suggesting that to the leader of the squeaking clarinet choir is a good idea, because now that’s exactly what we’re going to do in our next impromptu concert.”

At that, Jeno and Jaemin both screamed “No!” and attempted to tackle him to the ground in the middle of the stands.

“I take it back! I take it back!” Jaemin screamed amid Donghyuck’s cackling laughter.

“I thought Doyoung killed the choir!” Jeno yelled, shaking Donghyuck by the shoulders.

“The choir can never die!” Donghyuck screeched, using his clarinet to try to ward off Jeno and Jaemin and mostly failing.

“What are you idiots doing?” Yeri said from the other side of Jeno. They all stilled in shame under the weight of her glare.

Donghyuck opened his mouth to reply, but the crowd suddenly erupted into cheers. Oh, apparently, they scored a touchdown. Well, the fight song he definitely had memorized, at least.

-

Mark didn’t, like, exactly vibe with the low brass in the way that he vibed with the woodwinds, but Ten was a true trombone at heart, and Mark felt weird if he was separated from Ten. The section was only the two of them, right? So, if he wasn’t with Ten, then he was essentially sectionless. Mina kept, like, accusing him of abandoning the flutes, but if he sat on the flute bus, and Ten sat on the low brass bus, well, was that even allowed? Also, the clarinets were on the flute bus, and Mark didn’t think he was emotionally equipped to handle that at the moment.

Mark had come to accept that he, um, had a crush on Donghyuck. He connected the dots when Donghyuck dragged him and Renjun to the main quad last week to take pictures of them with their red and blue hair, and he thought that every picture of Donghyuck looked absolutely breathtaking, even the ones that made Donghyuck wrinkle his nose and demand that he delete them. Mark could admit it, okay? It took him a while to figure it out, but he felt pretty stupid now looking back at all the times Donghyuck tried to talk to him this year and he got so nervous he broke out into a cold sweat.

“Then, Duckie spent then next hour beating Doyoung in eight straight games of flip cup,” Yangyang said, finishing up a NCTUMB party story in the seat across from him and Ten. “It was awesome.”

“Wait, you know Donghyuck?” Mark couldn’t help but ask, butting into the conversation.

“Yeah, we marched the whole _West Side Story_ show next to each other. That shit bonds you for life.” Yangyang shrugged before seeming to remember something. He broke out into a wide grin and wriggled his eyebrows at him. “Why do you ask, Mark?”

Damn it, Ten had probably told all of the trombones about his stupid crush on Donghyuck. How Ten knew before him, he only hoped to never find out. God, this was so embarrassing.

“I, uh, no reason?” He tried, praying it would blow over.

“Can’t you tell? He’s in love!” Ten cried, throwing an arm around him. Mark swatted away a hand that was trying to pinch his cheek while the rest of the trombones laughed around him. What did he do to deserve this?

“Dude, can you not?” Mark tried to shrug out of Ten’s grip, but he couldn’t.

“It’s okay, Mark. You can admit that Donghyuck is your manic pixie dream girl,” Ten giggled.

“He’s my what?” Mark startled. What did that even mean? Was that a reference he was supposed to get? This was the worst band bus ride in history.

“He’s your Ramona Flowers! Just look at his fucking hair,” Ten said. This was apparently some great joke that everyone understood, because all the trombones around them started laughing.

“It’s not a perfect analogy, but it is…oddly apt,” Johnny snickered.

“It’s not like that,” Mark tried to deny, but to be honest, he didn’t even know what he was denying.

Jungwoo, from two seats behind them, stuck his head into the aisle to add, “Dude, it kind of is,” and what felt like the entire bus around them burst into laughter.

Screw Ten, next time, Mark was just going to sit on the flute bus.

-

“Okay, so do you think the black because it looks bomb or the blue because of school spirit, or whatever?” Jaemin asked, holding two shirts up to his chest. Jeno had to admit that he didn’t really see the point in dressing to impress at a band party where, a) everyone there had already seen you drenched and covered in mud from that one _West Side Story_ rehearsal that they refused to cancel despite apocalyptic rainfall, and b) nearly every other dude there would be dressed in jeans and a t-shirt due to reason a).

That being said, “School spirit all the way, man. Go Blue, am I right?”

Jaemin gave him an unimpressed look. “First of all,” he started, “It’s ‘Go Red,’ and I know you fucking know that. Second of all, school spirit is not a good excuse to wear a t-shirt to a party, even if it’s a band party. Third of all…” he trailed off. “Well, I forgot what I was going to say, but third of all fuck you.”

Jeno let out a loud laugh at Jaemin attempting to curse him out. Even though rooming together this year had given Jaemin plenty of opportunities to practice, swearing had always been something Jaemin could never quite seem to do with enough venom to make it believable. He was about to tell him just that when a knock on their door cut him off. Jeno went to get it, and behind the door, Yeri was leaning against the doorframe, holding a plastic bag.

“Yo, Jaemin, I have that skirt you wanted,” she said, tossing the bag over to Jaemin.

“Oh, sweet, thank you!” Jaemin said.

Jeno had a feeling he didn’t want to know, but he had to ask, “Why do you need a skirt?”

“The saxes are doing Walk of Shame Spirit Day next week,” Jaemin said, as if that was self-explanatory, which, okay, fair point. “Okay, Yeri, black shirt or blue shirt?”

“Are you seriously asking me that? This is a band party, wear the blue, for god’s sake.”

“You guys are the worst,” Jaemin said over Jeno’s laughter, but he put on the blue shirt anyway.

There was another knock on the door, or string of incessant knocking, more like, and Jeno opened it to reveal Donghyuck and Renjun. Renjun was dressed in the classic band party look (jeans and a t-shirt), but Donghyuck was wearing skin-tight black pants and a jauntily tucked-in button down with the top three buttons undone. Even Jaemin stopped changing to give him a confused once over.

“Wow, Duckie, you look hot,” Yeri supplied.

“Implying I don’t always look hot,” Donghyuck said, flopping on to Jeno’s bed. His faded red hair splayed out around him in a sad-looking halo.

“Someone you’re trying to impress?” Yeri said with a teasing tilt to her voice.

Donghyuck said nothing, but the embarrassment written all over his face spoke volumes.

“Oh? Are you finally going to make a move on Mark?” Jeno asked. If Donghyuck and Mark finally got their shit together, then maybe Donghyuck would stop moping about constantly. Also, maybe he would stop crying into Doyoung’s arms every time he had more than three drinks at a party.

“No,” Donghyuck said seriously.

At that, Jeno frowned. “Duckie—”

“No, I don’t want to hear it. He’s never shown any romantic interest in me, and he never texts me back, and he’s made absolutely no effort to talk to me pretty much at all this year, and I’m done.” Donghyuck sat up from where he’d been lying on Jeno’s bed, looking uncharacteristically sad. “I don’t want to make a move on him. I just want to get over it.”

Jeno’s heart sank a little. Seeing Donghyuck, his best friend whose mere presence could light up any room like a literal ray of sunshine on a cloudy day, so obviously sad twisted his insides in an uncomfortable way. He sat down next to him and held out his hand of Donghyuck to hold. Yeri sat down on the other side of him and threw her arms around him, nuzzling her nose into his neck. “Then let’s get over it. We’re going to get you so drunk at this party that you and Doyoung start crying again,” she said.

“Fuck you, that only happened, like, twice.”

“Try four times,” Jeno snorted.

“Okay, whatever, are we pregaming this bitch or not?”

-

“What…is happening?” Mark couldn’t help but ask.

“Oh, that?” Yeri said from beside him. “That’s new this year. Doyoung and Duckie have a special ‘section leader bond,’” she said with air quotes. “They do this at every party. Hey, Jeno!” she yelled out to Jeno, who was several feet away in the kitchen.

“Yeah?” Jeno called back.

“About what time would you say it is?”

Jeno popped his head through the doorway and looked around until his eyes found the couch where Doyoung and Donghyuck where clutching each at other, crying. “Well, Doyoung and Duckie are in the crying stage, but have not yet advanced to the shots stage, and we got here at around 10, so I would say after midnight but before one, maybe a quarter ‘til.”

Yeri pulled out her phone and flashed the lock screen at Mark. It read 12:42AM. “12:42, right on the money!”

“Hell yeah, let’s go shotgun a beer!”

-

Mina yawned and stretched her arms above her head before realizing that her borderline crop top was creeping up and quickly pulled it down. She sighed; themed spirit days in the flute section, for some reason, always meant skimpy outfits. She wouldn’t have to deal with this shit if she played the saxophone, but then again… She glanced over to the saxophone section where she could see Jaemin Na running around in a skirt so short she could see his boxer briefs sticking out the bottom and reflected that partial nudity was probably just a part of the culture.

She turned her gaze instead to the 50-yard line, where Mark was making his way over to the flute section. Mark had _finally_ given into Mina’s threats to publicly disown him and was participating in a flute spirit day instead of making up the most low-effort spirit day possible to do with Ten. Green Pants Spirit Day? Come on, Mark. Weak. His finally agreeing to return to his flute section roots on this particular day might have had more to do with Ten’s deep commitment to participating in the trombone section’s annual Prom Dress Spirit Day than anything else, but hey, Mina wasn’t going to look a gift horse in the mouth. Mark caught her eye and waved in her direction.

“Mark!” Tzuyu and Chaeyoung called out in twin high-pitched shrieks before Mina could even think about waving back. They both sprinted 20 yards to hug Mark so aggressively, they nearly tackled him into the ground. Ah, to be young again.

“Welcome back, traitor!” Mina called out as the three of them made their way back to the flute section in a giggling tangle of limbs. “Are you here to beg to be let back into the flute section?”

Mark just shrugged and smiled. “Hard to resist the tried-and-true flute section classic, Laundry Day Spirit Day.”

Mark was wearing the exact same outfit he wore to last year’s flute section Laundry Day Spirit Day, which consisted of baby pink knee-high socks, basketball shorts, and a sweater with sleeves that barely passed his elbows that he had obviously actually shrunk in the wash at one point. Honestly? Iconic. God bless Mark Lee.

Mina let the sophomores catch up for a bit, but she couldn’t help notice that Mark’s eyes kept traveling distractedly over to where Donghyuck Lee was leading the clarinet sectional in a pink dress roughly the same shade as Mark’s socks. Mina scanned the rest of the clarinets and realized, ah, he was dressed as Princess Peach for the clarinet’s Smash Bros Spirit Day. No offense to Jaemin Na, but Donghyuck was pulling off the cross-dressing way better. Mina turned back to look at Mark and he instantly turned away, ears red. Man, it had been a year and Mark still couldn’t take his eyes off this kid? Why didn’t he just ask him out already?

When Mark was finally free from Tzuyu and Chaeyoung’s clutches, he made his way over to her. Mina wriggled her eyebrows at him. “So, you and Duckie, huh?”

“I, uh, no?” Mark shot a panicked look over to the clarinets, as if there were some chance of Donghyuck overhearing them from more than 50 yards away. Mina rolled her eyes.

“Try again,” she said.

Mark sighed. “Okay, fine, I like him okay? It’s not a big deal.” Huh, that was easier than she thought it would be.

“I have to say, I’m not surprised. I kind of thought that you guys might have been dating last year.”

“You what? Really?”

Mina shrugged. “You spent all of every bus ride last season giggling with him. It was either you liked him or he was some sort of comedic genius never before known to man.”

Mark frowned. “Donghyuck’s really funny.”

Mina laughed. “Of course he is. You should tell him you like him. What are you waiting for? Do it. Do it this weekend.”

“I don’t think I can. I kind of fucked it up, I think,” Mark said pathetically.

“Hmm? How so?”

“Well, I don’t know exactly, but he’s not really texting me anymore, and he used to, like, talk to me during rehearsal, and now he kind of avoids me, and I don’t know if I’m reading too much into it, but yeah.”

Oh no, Mina could absolutely not deal with this sad, pathetic look on Mark’s face. She grabbed both of his shoulders and shook him a little. “Listen Mark, I know you’re off in fancy drum major land now, but you’ll always be a flute no matter what. So, tell me, who is the patron saint of the flute section?

“…Beyoncé?”

“Exactly, and pray tell me, what would Beyoncé say in this situation?”

“Uh, I woke up like this?”

Mina tried not to feel disappointed. “Okay, yes, but I was going for more of a ‘nothings perfect, but it’s worth it,’ kind of vibe. Or, you know what, ‘if you like it then you should’ve put a ring on it.’ That’s what I’m going with.”

Mark looked, if possible, even more panicked. “I’m not sure that’s applicable in this situation?”

“Yes, is it! Look, how are you gonna feel if he starts dating someone else and you never took a chance? You’re going to feel like Beyoncé’s stupid ex watching her dance with another man, knowing that he can’t say shit about it.”

At that, Mark seemed pensive. He looked back over at Donghyuck and his pink, pink dress. Ah, a look of determination. Success. Before Mark could respond, Joy called on all the flutes to line up for pictures.

They posed for the spirit day pictures and Mina used it as an excused to wrap her arms around Mark’s waist and squeeze him as tight as possible. He turned bright red and stiffened immediately, and Mina couldn’t help but snort in laughter. This kid had always been so easy to fluster, and it was honestly refreshing that drum major-dom hadn’t changed a thing.

Mina yelled after Mark when made his way back to the podium after pictures. “Never forget that I’ll—”

“You’ll never forgive me for leaving, I know,” Mark yelled back.

“Never forget it, Lee!”

“Are we still on for lunch tomorrow?”

“Yes, definitely! Text me!”

-

“Okay, here’s the thing,” Mark said, cornering Donghyuck in the basement after spending the entire party trying to get him alone. Donghyuck knew that Mark had spent the entire party trying to get him alone because Donghyuck had spent the entire party trying to avoid being alone with Mark. “I don’t, um, I don’t always know what I’m doing, exactly.”

Donghyuck rolled his eyes and shifted his body, subtly trying to inch his way away from Mark. There was probably still time to escape this conversation if he played his cards right. “Yeah, no shit, Sherlock.”

“I’m serious, man! And I, like, try to be normal, but when it comes to you, I can never seem to get it right.” Okay, cards definitely not played right. Looks like this conversation was going to happen whether he wanted it to or not. Donghyuck admitted defeat and looked back up at Mark, expectantly. Mark seemed to take his eye contact as a sign of encouragement and exhaled deeply before continuing. “I’m trying, man, I really am, but sometimes I need, like, I need some help. I just need you to tell me what you’re thinking, because I can’t read minds, and I can’t figure out what you’re thinking when I barely know what I’m thinking, you know? And, I really like you, and I don’t know how to do this without fucking it all up.”

“Mark Lee,” Donghyuck said, after a beat of silence, “I hate you so much. This has got to be the worst confession ever in recorded history. You are the stupidest boy on the planet, and I can’t believe I still like you.” Then, he fisted Mark’s t-shirt in his hands, and he kissed him.

-

“What is happening?” Yangyang barely stopped himself from screeching.

“It would appear that Duckie and Mark are making out in the basement of the drumline house,” Yeri said, suddenly appearing beside him with Jeno in tow.

“Since when is that a thing?” Yangyang wondered. “I thought for sure Ten would have texted the trombone group chat the second it happened.”

“Well, _Sk8er Boi_ is currently playing, and they started making out during _We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together_ , which was two songs ago, so I would say it’s been a thing for the length of about three pop songs.”

“I have been meaning to ask, what is up with this playlist?” Jeno asked from the other side of Yeri, taking a sip of his beer.

“I just asked Yuta, and he said he made it because, and I quote, ‘bitches love _Sk8er Boi_ ,’” Yeri deadpanned.

“Well, the flutes certainly do seem happy,” Jeno said with a grin.

Yeri snorted and held out a hand for Jeno to fist bump. “Nice.”

“Wow, what happened to flarinet solidarity?” Yangyang asked, tearing his eyes away from where Mark and Donghyuck continued to make out more and more enthusiastically as _Sk8er Boi_ came to an end and _Toxic_ started filtering through the speakers.

“They wanted to be the flarinets, we wanted to be the clutes, it was all downhill after that,” Jeno shrugged.

“I think Joy actually unfollowed Doyoung on Instagram. It was ugly.”

“Yeah, Duckie might be fraternizing with the enemy,” Jeno snickered.

They all glanced back at Donghyuck and Mark, who were, yup, still aggressively making out in plain sight of everyone in this basement. Yangyang pulled a face. “Well, I definitely need alcohol after seeing that,” he concluded. “Do you guys wanna do shots?”

“Yo, Yangyang, come shotgun a beer with us!” Jeno cried, suddenly unreasonably excited.

“Wow, I’ve never shotgunned a beer before,” Yangyang said and Jeno and Yeri both audibly gasped.

“Yangyang, my sweet summer child, we have so much to teach you.” Yeri threw her arm around him and dragged him out of the basement. Before he could register what was happening, the three of them were standing in a small circle in the kitchen of the drumline house (“Tile,” Yeri had said with a shrug, pointing at the floor.), each holding a can of beer.

“You ready?” Yeri asked, pulling out her keys and spinning the keyring around her pointer finger.

“Yeah,” he said, reaching for his keys in his back pocket, “I’m ready. Let’s get it.”

-

Mark was sweating. He was so nervous that he was actually sweating. Yeah, he and Donghyuck did spend probably half an hour making out in Taeyong’s basement the night before, but drunken make outs and dates were so not the same thing, even if Mark had walked Donghyuck back to his dorm after, and Donghyuck had kissed him again before he went in, and Mark had felt like he was flying.

“Hello, anyone in there?” Donghyuck asked, tapping Mark’s forehead with his pointer finger. Mark startled, not having even realized that he’d arrived at their pre-arranged meeting place outside of Donghyuck’s dorm. Donghuck’s hair had faded since he’d dyed it all those weeks ago into an uneven red-peach-pink with what was bordering on an inch of dark roots, and Mark would be lying if he said it was a good look, but at the same time, he thought it was breathtaking. He thought everything about Donghyuck was breathtaking. Sometimes, when Donghyuck smiled too widely or laughed too loudly or just kind of generally looked in his direction for too long, Mark thought the rising feeling in his chest might actually kill him, but also, he kind of liked it? Maybe he had lost a little bit of objectivity when it came to Donghyuck these days.

“Yeah, hi, sorry, um,” Mark wiped his palms on his jeans, and, in a split-second decision, reached out to grab Donghyuck’s hand, interlacing their fingers. “Hi,” he said again, dumbly.

Donghyuck rolled his eyes, but he was hiding a grin in the corner of his mouth. “Hi.”

Mark spent a few moments just smiling at Donghyuck before Donghyuck spoke again. “Well, are we going to go, or are we just going to stand here all day?”

“Go, I mean, let’s definitely go.”

“Okay.”

“Okay.”

Mark turned towards the street and pulled Donghyuck along by his hand.

**Author's Note:**

> As promised, here is the instrument breakdown I went with:
> 
> • Drum major: Ten (former trombone), Mark (former flute)  
> • Clarinet: Doyoung, Haechan, Jeno, Shotaro, Jisung  
> • Alto sax: Taeil, Xiaojun, Jaemin  
> • Tenor sax: Kun  
> • Trumpet: Winwin, Renjun, Chenle  
> • Mellophone: Sungchan  
> • Trombone: Johnny, Yangyang  
> • Tuba: Jungwoo (former clarinet), Lucas, Hendery  
> • Drumline: Taeyong, Yuta, Jaehyun 
> 
> I admit that I put more people into the clarinets than I otherwise might have for the sake of the story taking place mainly in the clarinet section, but I still stand by it lmao.
> 
> Also, if you’ve never shotgunned a beer, that’s when you, uhh, stab a hole through the bottom of the can with your keys, pop the tab on the top, and then chug the whole beer upside down through the hole you made in the bottom. Listen, don't blame me, blame generations of frat boys.
> 
> Also! I literally just made a writer’s twitter account, so [follow me on twitter](https://twitter.com/lanaroolz) if you want! Not sure how much I will end up using it, but here it is. 
> 
> Wow I really had a lot to say in the notes for this fic didn’t I.


End file.
